Posts Tagged ‘Pancreatic Differentiation’
Adult Stem Cells and Pancreatic Differentiation
Posted by admin in stem cells on June 21st, 2009
Adult stem cells are found in most tissues, where they are thought to participate in natural turnover and regeneration. Under defined conditions, some of these cells can also be significantly expanded and differentiated along specific lineages. This post is focused on mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs), which can be isolated from virtually every organ of the human body. While MSCs have a wellproven potential to give rise to connective tissues (e.g., bone, cartilage, fat, etc.), their ability to differentiate into endodermal cell types (and particularly insulinproducing beta cells) is Read the rest of this entry »
Pancreatic development
Posted by admin in stem cells on June 20th, 2009
Pancreatic development is arguably the best-studied example of organogenesis. Both gain-of-function and loss-of-function studies conducted in mice over the last decade have contributed to our understanding of a basic “genetic roadmap” of pancreatic – and particularly endocrine – development. Here we review this knowledge from the onset of the pancreatic program in the foregut epithelium (with the expression of the critical regulators Pdx1 and Ptf1a) to the specification of ductal, exocrine, and endocrine cell types. A special emphasis is placed on the development of endocrine beta cells, which are destroyed in type I diabetes and therefore constitute the endpoint of many stem cell differentiation protocols. Read the rest of this entry »